SMOKES & DAGGERS

A mischievous mix of (mostly) news

THE Department of Housing revealed the importance of one missing word in a social media message this week when it wrote: ‘We cannot thank our colleagues in CorkCityFire and in other brigades nationwide for their hard work during this difficult time.’ We think they meant ‘cannot thank them ENOUGH’.

ENGLAND was in the grips of a World Cup frenzy, proclaiming, ‘It’s coming home.’ It’s not. But when English tourists in Dublin asked locals to say ‘It’s coming home’ as Gaeilge, they were given the translation, ‘tiocfaidh ár lá’. A viral video shows the England fans singing the football hit lustily with those words.

AS BRITAIN’S royal correspondents descended on Dublin for the visit of Harry and Meghan, one title proved to be a tongue-twister for them. One TV interview prompted the Twitter response: ‘So just for the record, the Irish PM pronunciation is “tea-shock”, and not “tea-set” as said here, and it’s Croke Park, not Crowes Park.’ But apart from that it was grand…

DEPUTY Brid Smyth, pictured, was hot under the collar on the subject of climate change, insisting the rapid phasing out of fossil fuels. ‘At this stage there is hardly anybody, apart from Deputy Danny Healy-Rae, Deputy Michael Healy-Rae and Donald Trump, who denies the science on climate change,’ she said. She hammered it home further: ‘Even the Taoiseach has said it is the greatest challenge facing humanity currently.’ And Leo, as we all know, is not one for indulging in ‘trivial’ matters.